


A Game of Charades

by Aceofstars16



Category: Gravity Falls
Genre: Comic: Gravity Falls: Lost Legends, Lost Legends Zine, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-28
Updated: 2020-02-28
Packaged: 2021-02-20 06:02:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,504
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22944328
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aceofstars16/pseuds/Aceofstars16
Summary: Mabel has no face and Stan can only think of one person who can fix it.
Relationships: Ford Pines & Mabel Pines, Ford Pines & Stan Pines, Mabel Pines & Stan Pines
Kudos: 78





	A Game of Charades

**Author's Note:**

> [ Tumblr Post](https://aceofstars16.tumblr.com/post/611244522030186496/a-game-of-charades)

Stan had seen a lot of crazy things in Gravity Falls. But walking into the living room to find his great niece with no face might have been the most unsettling.

Sidestepping away from the doorway, Stan shook his head, trying to clear the image from his mind. He loved Mabel, but that crooked, red marker smile was very disturbing. Unfortunately, Stan knew exactly who would be able to help in this situation, or at least he better be able to help. And even if he didn’t want Stan around, he hoped Ford would at least want to help Mabel.

“Ford!”

Walking down into the basement, Stan felt an odd sense of discomfort at seeing the place actually being used. Every other time he had walked into this room, it had held a sense of sorrow to it, a darkness that crept into the edges. Not to mention the spiderwebs and dust piles – he had always been more focused on the portal than the cleanliness of the machines. Now it looked used, clean, and bright – though he couldn’t help but notice a hint of sorrow still lingered in his chest. Ford might be back, but it wasn’t exactly what he had been hoping for.

“Yes, Stanley?”

Ford’s inquisitive voice shook Stan out of his thoughts and brought him back to the problem at hand – Mabel. She was what mattered right now, Stan had been dealing with this rift between him and his brother for years, it could be shoved into the back of his mind a little longer.

“Any idea why in the world Mabel is upstairs sitting on the couch without a face?” Might as well get right to the point, no use in dancing around the issue. And if it was a time sensitive thing, Stan was not going to let his great niece be stuck without a face. For her sake and his.

“No face…” Ford frowned, but after a moment, he nodded. “I think I know what’s responsible.”

* * *

“Mr. What’s His Face? Seriously? You have no imagination.”

Ford sighed as he made his way to the front room, but he couldn’t help but find it slightly amusing. His names for anomalies hadn’t always been the greatest, and that was probably one of his least imaginative ones. But changing it seemed unfair to his younger self.

“And what would you have called it?” It was a challenge but Ford was also curious. Stan always had been a little better at coming up with…interesting ideas.

“It steals faces, it’s ugly looking – wait, it’s ugly right? I mean why else would it want faces? So, it’s ugly and likes collecting faces…how about Head Swiper, or Expression Snatcher, or The Face Off.”

Ford looked back at Stan, the last suggestion freezing him in his tracks.

“Okay…so maybe not that last one. But it’s gotta be catchy, and Mr. whatever you said is way too long.”

“It seemed appropriate at the time.” Ford defended himself, but he felt a small smile trying to work its way onto his face. It almost felt like old times for a split second. Ever since he had gotten back, there was always a tension when Stan was around, but it was almost as if the banter had eased it.

“There is no appropriate time for a name like that,” Stan retorted, a smug smirk on his face as he glanced at Ford. For a moment, they just looked at each other, then something snapped and the tension rose again. Stan looked away, then continued walking forward muttering over his shoulder, “Come on. Mabel’s not getting her face back with us just standing here.”

Trying to squash the disappointment in his chest, Ford followed. Those days of being a carefree kid were long gone, he was surprised he even remembered them after everything that had happened. But he supposed some feelings you could never truly forget. It didn’t matter now though, that was in the past. The present was what mattered and right now he needed to figure out how in the world he was going to find Mr. What’s His Face.

As he walked into the room, Ford saw Mabel sitting on the couch. She looked normal from where he stood, but then she turned her head and he took a step back in surprise. It was a little unsettling. Granted, he had seen a few other creatures without faces during his first encounter with the face stealing anomaly, but it was different seeing the effect on a member of his family.

“So…you can fix her, right?”

Ford frowned, wracking his brain for any information that could be of use. It had been ages since he had even thought about Mr. What’s His Face, and while he had occasionally used his journals over the past few weeks, he rarely ever reread his old entries – some he avoided all together.

“Well, the good news is, her face is still somewhere. It’s just a matter of finding the creature and getting it back. Which may be challenging. If I remember correctly, it stays hidden, probably in a supernatural black market of sorts that I’ve only heard about. Due to humans not being allowed there.”

Stan crossed his arms and frowned. “Okay, so, how do we get to this so-called black market?”

“I did some research on it, but I could never pin down an entrance. Maybe if I look at my old notes and search around town-” Ford was cut off by something pulling at his coat. No, not something, someone. Mabel, despite not being able to see the surroundings of her body, had made her way over to them and was gesturing to them.

“Uh, sweetie, whacha doing?” Stan asked, crouching down to Mabel’s level as she continued to make motions.

At first, Ford wasn’t quite sure what she was trying to convey, but then he started noticing the patterns. She kept moving her finger over her forehead in the shape of…

“Dipper?”

A quick nod. Then she pointed away from her, in the general direction of the door.

“He went after Mr. What’s His Face?” Ford found himself getting into the zone. When he was younger, he had always been good at nonverbal communication – there were times when he had been able to understand whole ideas from Stan without either of them saying a word. Though some could argue that it was a twin thing. But then, after exploring many different dimensions, he had found that sometimes gestures were the only way to communicate, and his skill had only increased. He was quite the charade master now, or at least, he liked to think so.

“That’s great and all, but how does that help us?” Stan glanced around the room, though Ford suspected it was more from annoyance than anything else.

“Well, if Mabel can hear us, and if she can give us enough clues…” Ford trailed off, then crouched down next to Stan. “Mabel, do you know where you are?”

Mabel tilted her head, seemingly lost in thought. For a second, she just stood there, then she held up her finger and jumped up before crouching down and pointing at the ground.

“You’re in the basement?” Stan asked quickly, and Ford couldn’t help but think it might be due to the fact that he wanted to be the one to figure out where Mabel was and how to help.

“No, I would’ve seen her, and Mr. What’s His Face. He doesn’t just leave faces lying around after all,” Ford said, frowning as Mabel got down on her hands and knees and pointed down multiple times in a row.

“Why can’t you just call it the Face Snatcher, that sounds so much better,” Stan said, looking in confusion at Mabel as she continued to point down.

Ford opened his mouth, about to defend the terrible old name he had given the creature, when he realized what Mabel was trying to say. “Underground? You’re underground?”

She nodded quickly.

“Oh please tell me it’s not those caverns with the dinosaurs…” Stan mumbled.

“The what-?” Ford shook his head. “Never mind. Underground. I bet…Mabel, does it look like some kind of market? With lots of different anomalies?”

Another fast nod.

“The market…I knew it. Did you happen to see where it entered, or how to get in?” Excitement started growing in Ford’s chest. Despite not thinking about the black market in ages, he couldn’t help but relish the opportunity to actually find it and study it up close. After getting Mabel’s face back of course.

Mabel held up a finger but froze before slumping down a little. Then she shrugged, outlining a door and turning her hand like she was holding a key.

“Ah…I see…”

“You see what? She doesn’t know how she got in, right? Aside from it being a door. And there are a bajillion doors around Gravity Falls.” The annoyance in Stan’s voice was laced with worry and Ford’s frown deepened as he tried to figure out what the next logical step would be. There had to be other ways into the market aside from that one door.

“Mabel, can you remember seeing anything that might have been another entrance?” Ford rubbed his chin, trying to remember all the doors he had experimented with before when trying to find the market. Of course there were the cursed doors, but those were far too dangerous to try. There had to be a safer way in. Or as safe as the supernatural could be.

Mabel tilted her head, shrugging.

“Anything that looked out of place? Or…strange? Anything that reminded you of something you’ve seen in Gravity Falls?”

“This clearly isn’t working, Stanford, there are other ways to find an entrance, right? You have three books on this town!” Stan threw his hands up in the air before crossing them over his chest again.

“I told you, Stan, I’ve never actually found a way into the market before.” Pinching his nose, Ford tried to reason out what to do if Mabel couldn’t help him find an entrance. He had learned quite a few things in the multiverse, maybe he could use some of the bits and pieces he had brought back from other dimensions to make a detector of sorts.

Something tugged at Ford’s coat again and he glanced back at Mabel. “Did you remember something?”

She juggled her hands up and down in a maybe gesture, before using her fingers to make a crescent shape in the air, then she pretended to open a door and squatted down.

“…are you getting anything from that? Because I’m just weirded out.”

Stan was talking, but Ford barely heard him. He was trying to piece together what Mabel was attempting to describe. Then she started reaching and pulling something from the imaginary place, like she was grabbing paper or...

“That’s it!”

Mabel fell down at his shout and Stan jumped back, before frowning. “What’s it?”

“An outhouse, that’s what you saw?” Ford asked, ignoring Stan’s question as he started trying to retrace the steps he had taken over thirty years ago.

Scrambling to her feet, Mabel nodded quickly.

“An outhouse, really?” Stan questioned, raising his eyebrows.

“I studied them years ago, they can be tricky to find and are a little unpredictable, but it’s our best bet.”

* * *

Stan didn’t understand what Ford’s plan was, but that was probably because his brother didn’t tell him anything about it. All he knew was that one minute they were trying to communicate with Mabel through charades and the next, Ford was rushing off to the basement.

“Yeah, sure, don’t include me. Not like she’s my great niece too or anything,” Stan mumbled to himself.

Something bumped his leg and he looked down and saw Mabel, who had her hand out like she was feeling for something. Stan was about to ask what she needed, when she wrapped her arms around his legs.

“Hey, don’t worry kiddo,” he said, patting her head. “If Ford’s outhouse thing doesn’t work out, I’ll dig my own entrance to that stupid black market.”

“I got it!”

Looking up, Stan saw Ford holding some sort of gun in his hand.

“What is that?”

“A freeze ray. I acquired it in a tundra dimension, very useful. I’ve been wanting to test it out on some anomalies ever since I got back.” As he spoke, Ford fiddled with the gun, probably checking to make sure it wouldn’t blow up or something.

“Yeah…maybe wait to test it out when Mabel’s face isn’t on the line.” Leave it to Ford to use a possibly dangerous gun at a time like this.

“Nonsense, it will work fine. Come, Mabel.” Ford started rushing towards the door and Stan rolled his eyes.

“She can’t see idiot!” Reaching out, Stan was about to grab Mabel’s hand, when Ford came back in and did just that, rushing off before Stan could register what was going on.

“Hey, wait up!”

“No time!” The front door slammed shut and Stan quickly raced after them, only to see the edge of Mabel’s sweater disappearing into the woods. Shesh, when had Ford gotten so athletic?

“You better bring her back with all of her parts in the right place!”

Sighing, Stan frowned at the woods before reaching behind the couch and grabbing his bat. Just in case. If they weren’t back in thirty minutes, he’d go kick some face stealing butt himself.

* * *

“Yes, there it is!” Ford grinned down at Mabel, before remembering that she couldn’t see him. Glancing back at the outhouse, he shuddered, remembering the one time he had entered it and ended up in the desert. But this time would be different, hopefully.

“Alright, you better wait here, I’ll go in and-“

Mabel pulled on his hand then started tracing on her head with her finger again, the same shape as before.

“Dipper?”

She nodded, then pointed into the woods.

“He’s in the woods?”

A quick shake of the head, then pointing down again.

“He’s in the market with you?” Adrenaline pulsed through Ford’s veins as he wondered what they might be experiencing down there, and wishing he was with them.  
At Mabel’s nod, Ford grinned, only for it to fall as Mabel quickly pulled on his coat again, hopping on her feet, which made a knot of anxiety grow in his chest.

“You’re in danger?”

Another nod.

Ford wracked his brain, a plan slowly starting to form in his mind. “Mabel, can you lead Dipper to the outhouse down there?”

She gave him a thumbs up, and he nodded, despite her not being able to see him. “Just tell me when you enter.”

A few seconds passed, then Mabel started flailing and Ford readied his gun.

One...two...the door flew open. Dipper and a blonde-haired girl bolted out, followed by the Face Snatcher.

“Prepare to be destroy-” It started saying, but Ford pulled the trigger and just like that, it was frozen.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm so glad I get to share this with y'all! I wrote this quite a while ago for the [Lost Legends Fanzine](https://lost-legends-zine.tumblr.com/), which I was so happy to get to participate in!  
> Hope y'all like it!


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